’Sweet Tea’ comes to the stage, as provocative as ever
Though some six years have passed since Chicago academic and performer E. Patrick Johnson set about collecting his groundbreaking oral history, Sweet Tea: Black Gay Men of the South, the book remains perhaps as urgent and provocative as ever. Johnson’s oral history, passed on to many in recent years through both the book and national speaking engagements, counters the stereotypes of the South as "backward" or "repressive" while telling a different story: One of celebration, heritage and pride.
And now, Johnson’s stories - drawing from the lives of more than 70 men, aged 19 to 93, from fifteen different states - have again taken a new form in a re-imagined production opening this weekend at the Viaduct Theatre.
The production, co-produced by Columbia College’s Ellen Stone Belic Institute for the Study of Women and Gender in the Arts and Media and About Face Theatre, again features Johnson trying on the lives of the many men featured in the book, but things are a little bit different this time around.
Alongside the stories collected from the chorus of men in Sweet Tea, the show gains immediacy through featuring Johnson’s own story. The Northwestern professor grew up and attended school in North Carolina, offering his own angle on the oft-overlooked identity conflation of growing up black and gay in the Southern tradition.
A challenge
Johnson told EDGE turning the microphone back in his direction was a challenge, one he feels has taken the work’s impact to a new level. While the work was previously his own domain, he said the production has benefited from the outside perspectives of the creative team assembled for the show, including director Daniel Alexander Jones. In the final days of rehearsal, he said he was both excited and nervous to take on his work in its latest form.
"This time, I had to write my own story, asking myself the same questions I asked all these men," said the renowned performer and author. "All along, I had been asking these men to reveal very personal things about their lives and that was a very difficult process for me."
The process of joining the larger-than-life chorus of the Sweet Tea men is understandably daunting. Jane Saks, executive director of Columbia’s ESI Institute and the production’s co-producer, describe the men as "irresistible in the true sense of the word."
"They’re bawdy, flamboyant, funny, pained, smart, irreverent and often sad. They deal with loss, great celebration and excitement. They’re magnets of all these disparate emotional responses and they force you to see and hear them, to try and understand who they are and what they’re grappling with in their lives," Saks said. "I’m in love with these guys."
Their stories reach deep into the pool of human experience and touch on many themes, including issues around coming out, family trauma and the HIV/AIDS epidemic. And even where audiences may not relate directly to their experiences, Saks hopes they will take away an enriched understanding of a different community from seeing the show.
"The men in Sweet Tea ask for your participation and that’s the kind of thing people will take away from it," Saks added. "They’ll look at their similarities and differences with the narrators’ stories. The goal is to investigate our similarities as much as understanding our differences as an asset."
Both Saks and Johnson also emphasize the importance of ancestry to the stories, given that they span so many generations and walks of life. Since their journey to this production began in workshops several years ago, some of the men in the book have passed away and, in the tradition of oral histories, many of their perspectives on their experiences may have also changed since their recording. Several of the men will be on hand for the show’s opening, serving as a reunion of sorts.
"These aren’t necessarily universal stories," Johnson said. "These are things that happened to these particular men in this particular context, and yet the irony is that these are things that reverberate throughout society. We’ve all experienced love and loss. Many have experienced discrimination of some sort."
Johnson hopes their stories, while also being relatable to some, will also encourage audience members to have a broader understanding of gay and lesbian lives and relationships while also speaking to the importance of storytelling within the community.
"I hope the show inspires people in the LGBT community to tell their stories and know that if they’re struggling, they’re never alone," Johnson said. They’re not the first ones to have gone through these struggles."
Sweet Tea: Black Gay Men of the South runs through May 29 at the Viaduct Theater (3111 N. Western). Visit www.aboutfacetheatre.com for tickets and more information, including blogs and videos from the Sweet Tea creative team, or call 773-296-6024.
Watch this video of the New York rehearsals of Sweet Tea.
Watch this clip of E. Patrick Johnson visiting George Eagerson, AKA Countess Vivian, in New Orleans. Eagerson is the oldest man Patrick interviewed for his book "Sweet Tea: Gay Black Men of The South, An Oral History".
